Prime Minister Donald Tusk, in an address on Saturday, October 31, said Friday’s events outside the Constitutional Tribunal were an attack on the rule of law, for which PiS, Konfederacja and presidents Andrzej Duda and Karol Nawrocki are responsible. He announced that the government would ensure the Tribunal’s security and working conditions.
The address, announced earlier by the Chancellery of the Prime Minister (we reported on the announcement of the speech for 8 p.m.), was published on gov.pl under the title „In Poland, Law Will Beat Violence”. Tusk called the events outside the Tribunal’s seat „scandalous” and said that peace cannot be achieved by giving in to lawlessness and violence.
The prime minister posted a video of the address on X:
Who the Prime Minister Blames
Tusk spoke of „groups of politicians and activists from PiS and Konfederacja jostling each other, from Braun to Bąkiewicz”. According to him, the attack on the Tribunal and its judges is another chapter in the destruction of the rule of law by PiS and presidents Duda and Nawrocki. He stressed that the police responded „calmly but firmly”, and that it was legally elected judges who were attacked, while officers protected the Tribunal from assailants.
The prime minister recalled attempts to repair the Tribunal made with a parliamentary majority. In his view, they were blocked by the president and PiS. He added that the Sejm had elected new judges who took their oaths, but the president did not accept them, and the judges themselves were blocked by Tribunal president Bogdan Święczkowski.
Tusk used the comparison of a thief who snatches an elderly woman’s handbag and then complains about violence. He criticised the „symmetrists” who propose dividing the „loot” in half. „In certain matters there can be no compromise,” he said. He also noted that a politician, „even if he is a president”, may not enter court premises and issue orders to judges.
The Russian Thread and Medvedev
The prime minister said the forces he criticised find support among pro-Russian circles and, in the current dispute, benefit from „armies of Russian bots”. He also mentioned „compliments from the chief ideologist of the Kremlin”. Shortly after the address, he responded on X, writing that Dmitry Medvedev speaks of a coup d’état in Poland and of the „oppression of PiS conservatives” by „Tusk’s liberals”. Tusk’s comment: „And everything is clear”.
What the Address Did Not Contain
In the published text, the prime minister did not mention resignation nor respond to demands that he step down. He did, however, say he is „certain” that the Tribunal will begin operating in line with the constitution, „regardless of me as well”, and that the government’s task is to ensure its security and working conditions. He presented no specific steps or deadlines. He also did not announce a decision on the disputed orders concerning the management of the Tribunal.
What It Means
The prime minister took a position in the dispute over who runs the Tribunal and backed the judges he considers legally elected. For readers, this means the government is pledging police protection for the Tribunal’s seat. The crisis remains unresolved: before Monday, November 3, when the Tribunal’s General Assembly has been convened, conflicting orders remain in force.
